While I’m on the road this month, here is a repeat from Valentine’s Day past. Happy Valentine’s Day and wishing you much chocolate!

Back in the BC era (Before Children), I considered myself a reasonably cultured person.

• Books? I bought them in hardbound so I’d be early enough to disagree with the review in the New York Times. 
• Movies?I saw them before Siskel & Ebert.

(Barb’s Guide to Films: if the characters kiss a lot, have sex, and then kill each other, it’s American. If the characters smoke a lot, have sex, and then kill themselves, it’s foreign.)

• Music? I once sat through an entire performance of Nixon in China. On purpose.
• Food?I ate pasta before they stopped calling it spaghetti. Even before you could get squid-ink pasta with arugula oil at the Jewel.
• News and Current Events? I cared about who won the Booker Prize…